Loving a Life of Biblical Womanhood
I have an extensive travel schedule lined up for this year. It started about two weeks ago, and will continue until the end of October. At one point, there will be an entire month that I’m away from home (although, thankfully it will be summer time so my family will be with me.)
In the past, once the growing season really kicked in, I would spend time in the garden every day, weeding, tending plants, etc. When the harvest started coming in, I’d preserve by drying, freezing, or canning…
Bread and butter pickles are an absolute favorite of mine. They’re kind of a savory/sweet combination that only a pickle can achieve. This recipe is straight from the Ball Book of Home Preserving. I consider Ball the the foremost expert on all things preserving and will almost always refer to them to answer any questions pertaining to preserving.
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You get to see my weedy garden in this garden update. I have spent hours in the garden since returning from vacation. This is what it looked like when we got home:
So, while it may seem like I need to weed, be impressed with what I accomplished (HA!).
I decided to do something a little different this morning and filmed my garden update rather than take a dozen different pictures. Enjoy!
This has been a very strange beginning for my garden. I was late getting any seeds planted, for one. The day that I planted my seeds, it was 90 degrees outside, so I went ahead and put corn, beans, winter and summer squash, watermelon, cantaloupe, radishes, carrots, and onions into the ground, worried I was too late. But the next weekend, the temperature drastically dropped. I don’t think it actually froze, but on my morning walk one morning, I saw several houses that had outside plants covered in protection, so if it didn’t frost, it came really close.
The end result? One single green bean plant grew, one single winter squash plant grew, and one single cucumber grew.
No melons or summer squash came up. Last week, I planted more, but put them in seed trays instead. Which, is probably a good thing, because last night it got down to 40.
The radishes, onions and carrots are doing great. I haven’t weeded around the carrots, because they’re still very young.
I had a friend give me a couple dozen tomato plants that are in the ground. They are still very small and hard to see:
I even have a little tomato growing already:
I have mixed batch of lettuce growing in a container:
I replanted the corn, and while I was taking pictures, found two of the four rows I planted growing (this picture was taken before I thinned them out.). No idea what happened to the other two rows. I have more planted, though, and will see what happens next. I will also plant green beans that grow on a vine instead of a bush at the base of these corn once I get in there and thin them out.
I have two blueberry bushes that had a nice amount of blooms on them this spring.
I also have a grape plant that has survived multiple hits with the lawn mower. I’d love to plant another one and build an arbor right where this one is and see if I can get some grapes out of them!
And, when cleaning out along my back fence, I found a massive blackberry bush!
And, as always, my horseradish plant is going to take over the world one day. This plant is four years old now. I’ve even cut off two major chunks of it to share with friends.
So, here in this Memorial Day Weekend…how does your garden grow?
It’s April 1st.
It’s April 1st and I haven’t planted a single seed. Not in a starter planter, not in a container, not in the ground.
I also haven’t cleared out my yard, tilled the earth, or prepared any rows.
I also haven’t even LOOKED at my compost bin in a year.
*sigh*
If this had been my first year gardening, it would have been my last year gardening. If I hadn’t successfully gardened for the last few years and had bounty to show for it, I would never delve a into seed-to-dirt lifestyle again.
This is what my yard looked like at 8:00 this morning:
This is what it looks like at 11:00 this morning:
My list for the week is now checked off by one! Now on to the deep cleaning of the house!
I’m not putting a menu up this week. Kaylee is in Florida visiting her dad and Gregg is jumping out of airplanes with the Kentucky National Guard and won’t be home until Friday. Consequently, the boys and I are “baching” it this week.
I cannot believe that 9 weeks have passed since I did a garden update!
I have been so busy with book releases and writing that gardening got put off to just now. Since we’re on vacation next week, I needed to just stop everything this week and get the garden planted.
We have a plot at our church. This is the first time we’ve done that, and I’m LOVING the size of my plot!
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